by Anthology
"Not that, either," declared Craven. "In fact, there are several type G stars. I examined them all and I know I'm right."
"How do you know?" challenged Stutsman.
"Spectroscopic examination. That collector field of ours gathers energy just like a burning glass. You've seen a burning glass, haven't you?"
He stared at Stutsman, directing the question at him. Stutsman shuffled awkwardly, unhappily.
"Well," Craven went on, "I used that for a telescope. Gathered the light from the suns and analyzed it. Of course it didn't act like a real telescope, produce an image or anything like that, but it was ideal for spectroscopic work."
They waited for him to explain. Finally, he continued:
"All of the stars I examined were just type G stars, nothing else but there was a difference in one of them. First, the spectroscope showed lines of reflected light passing through oxygen and hydrogen, water vapor and carbon dioxide. Pure planetary phenomena, never found on a star itself. Also it showed that a certain per cent of the light was polarized. Now remember that I examined it for a long time and I found out something else from the length of observation which convinces me. The light varied with a periodic irregularity. The chronometers aren't working exactly right out here, so I can't give you any explanation in terms of hours. But I find a number of regularly recurring changes in light intensity and character... and that proves the presence of a number of planetary bodies circling the star. That's the only way one could explain the fluctuations for the G-type star is a steady type. It doesn't vary greatly and has no light fluctuations to speak of. Not like the Cephids and Mira types."
"And that proves it's our Sun?" asked Chambers.
Craven nodded. "Fairly definitely, I'd say."
"How far away is it?" Stutsman wanted to know.
Craven snorted. "You would ask something like that."
"But," declared Stutsman, "there are ways of measuring how far a star is away from any point, measuring both the distance and the size of the star."
"Okay," agreed Craven, "you find me something solid and within reach that's measurable. Something, preferably, about 200 million miles or so across. Then I'll tell you how far we are from the Sun. This ship is not in an orbit. It's not fixed in space. I have no accurate way of measuring distances and angles simultaneously and accurately. Especially angles as small as these would be."
Craven and Stutsman glared at one another.
"It's a long way however you look at it," the financier said. "If we're going to get there, well have to start as soon as possible. How soon can we start, Doctor?"
"Very soon. I have the gravity concentration field developed and Manning left me just enough power to get a good start." He chuckled, took off his glasses, wiped the lenses and put them back on again. "Imagine him giving me that power!"
"But after we use up that power, what are we going to do?" demanded Chambers. "This collector lens of yours won't furnish us enough to keep going."
"You're right," Craven conceded, "but we'll be able to get more. We'll build up what speed we can and then we'll shut off the drive and let momentum carry us along. In the meantime our collector will gather power for us. We're advancing toward the source of radiation now, instead of away from it. Out here, where there's little gravity stress, fewer conflicting lines of gravitation, we'll be able to spread out the field, widen it, make it thousands of miles across. And the new photo-cells will be a help as well."
"How are the photo-cells coming?" asked Chambers.
Craven grinned. "We'll have a bank of them in within a few hours, and replace the others as fast as we can. I have practically the whole crew at work on them. Manning doesn't know it, but he found the limit of those photo-cells when he was heaving energy at us back in the Solar System. He blistered them. I wouldn't have thought it possible, but it was. You have to hand it to Manning and Page. They are a couple of smart men."
To the eye there was only one slight difference between the old cells and the new ones. The new type cell, when on no load, appeared milky white, whereas the old cells on no load were silvery. The granular surface of the new units was responsible for the difference in appearance, for each minute section of the surface was covered with even more minute metallic hexagonal pyramids and prisms.
"Just a little matter of variation in the alloy," Craven explained. "Crystalization of the alloy, forming those little prisms and pyramids. As a result, you get a surface thousands of times greater than in the old type. Helps you absorb every bit of the energy."
* * *
The Interplanetarian arrowed swiftly starward, driving ahead with terrific momentum while the collector lens, sweeping up the oncoming radiations, charged the great banks of accumulators. The G-type star toward which they were heading was still pale, but the two brighter stars to either side blazed like fiery jewels against the black of space.
"You say we'll be only a week or so behind Manning?" asked Chambers.
Craven looked at the financier, his eyes narrowed behind the heavy lenses. He sucked in his loose lips and turned once again to the control board.
"Perhaps a little longer," he admitted finally. "We're losing time, having to go along on momentum in order to collect power. But the nearer we get to those stars, the more power we'll have and we'll be able to move faster."
Chambers drummed idly on the arm of his chair, thinking.
"Perhaps there's time yet," he said, half to himself. "With the power we'll have within the Solar System, we can stop Manning and the revolution. We can gain control again."
* * *
Craven was silent, watching the dials.
"Manning might even pass us on the way back to look for us," Chambers went on. "He thinks we're still out there. He wouldn't expect to find us where we are, light years from where we started."
Craven shot him a curious look. "I wouldn't be too sure of that. Manning has a string of some sort tied to us. He's got us tagged... good and proper. He's always been able to find us again, no matter where we were. I have a hunch he'll find us again, even way out here."
Chambers shrugged his shoulders. "It really doesn't matter. Just so we get close enough to the Sun so we can load those accumulators and jam the photo-cells full. With a load like that we can beat him hands down."
The financier fell into a silence. He stared out of the vision plate, watching the stars. Still far away, but so much nearer than they had been.
His brain hummed with dreams. Old dreams, revived again, old dreams of conquest and of empire, dreams of a power that held a solar system in its grip.
Craven broke his chain of thoughts. "Where's our friend Stutsman? I haven't seen him around lately."
Chambers chuckled good-naturedly. "He's sulking. He seems to have gotten the idea neither one of us likes him. He's been spending most of his time back in the engine room with the crew."
"Were you talking about me?" asked a silky voice.
They spun around to see Stutsman standing in the doorway of the control room. His face was twisted into a wolfish grin and in his right hand he held a heat gun.
Chambers' voice was sharp, like the note of a clanging bell. "What's this?"
Stutsman's face twisted into an even more exaggerated grin. "This," he said, "is mutiny. I'm taking over!" He laughed at them.
"No use calling the crew. They're with me."
"Damn you!" shouted Chambers, taking a step forward. He halted as Stutsman jerked the pistol up.
"Forget it, Chambers. You're just second man from now on. Maybe not even second man. You tried out this dictator business and you bungled it. You went soft. You're taking orders from me from now on. No questions, no back talk. You do as I say and maybe you won't get hurt."
"You're mad, Stutsman!" cried Chambers. "You can't get away with this."
Stutsman barked out a brittle laugh. "Who is going to stop me?"
"The people," Chambers shouted at him. "The people will. They won't allow this. When you get back to the Solar System...
"
Stutsman growled, stepping toward Chambers, pistol leveled. "The people won't have anything to say about this. I'll rule the Solar System the way I want to. There won't be anyone else who'll have a thing to say about it. So you dreamed of empire, did you? You dreamed of a solar dictatorship. Well, watch me! I'll build a real empire. But I'll be the head of it... not you."
Craven sat down in his chair, crossed his knees. "Just what do you plan to do, Dictator Stutsman?"
Stutsman fairly foamed at the mouth over the insolence of Craven's voice. "I'll smash Manning first. I'll wipe him out. This ship will do it. You said yourself it would. You have ten times the power he has. And then..."
Craven raised a hand and waved him into silence. "So you plan to reach the Solar System, do you?" You plan to meet Manning, and destroy his ship. Nice plan."
"What's wrong with it?" challenged Stutsman.
"Nothing," said Craven calmly. "Absolutely nothing at all... except that we may never reach the Solar System!"
Stutsman seemed to sag. The wolfish snarl on his lips drooped. His eyes stared. Then with an effort he braced himself.
"What do you mean? Why can't we?" He gestured toward the vision plate, toward the tiny yellow star between the two brighter stars.
"That," said Craven, "isn't our Sun. It has planets, but it isn't out Sun."
Chambers stepped quickly to Craven, reached out a hand and hoisted him from the chair, shook him.
"You must be joking! That has to be the Sun!"
Craven shrugged free of Chambers' clutch, spoke in an even voice. "I never joke. We made a mistake, that's all. I hadn't meant to tell you yet. I had intended to get in close to the star and take on a full load of power and then try to locate our Sun. But I'm afraid it's a hopeless task."
"A hopeless task?" shrieked Stutsman. "You are trying to trick me. This is put up between the two of you. That's the Sun over there. I know it is!"
"It isn't," said Craven. "Manning tricked us. He started off in the wrong direction. He made us think he was going straight back to the Solar System, but he didn't. He circled and went in some other direction."
The scientist eyed Stutsman calmly. Stutsman's knuckles were white with the grip he had upon the gun.
"We're lost," Craven told him, looking squarely at him. "We may never find the Solar System!"
CHAPTER TWENTY
The revolution was over. Interplanetary officials and army heads had fled to the sanctuary of Earth. Interplanetary was ended... ended forever, for on every world, including Earth, material energy engines were humming. The people had power to burn, to throw away, power so cheap that it was practically worthless as a commodity, but invaluable as a way to a new life, a greater life, a fuller life... a broader destiny for the human race.
Interplanetary stocks were worthless. The mighty power plants on Venus and Mercury were idle. The only remaining tangible asset were the fleets of spaceships used less than a month before to ship the accumulators to the outer worlds, to bring them Sunward for recharging.
Patents protecting the rights to the material energy engines had been obtained from every government throughout the Solar System. New governments were being formed on the wreckage of the old. John Moore Mallory already had been inaugurated as president of the Jovian confederacy. The elections on Mars and Venus would be held within a week.
Mercury, its usefulness gone with the smashing of the accumulator trade, had been abandoned. No human foot now trod its surface. Its mighty domes were empty. It went its way, as it had gone for billions of years, a little burned out, worthless planet, ignored and shunned. For a brief moment it had known the conquering tread of mankind, had played its part in the commerce of the worlds, but now it had reverted to its former state... a lonely wanderer of the regions near the Sun, a pariah among the other planets.
* * *
Russell Page looked across the desk at Gregory Manning. He heaved a sigh and dug the pipe out of his jacket pocket.
"It's finished, Greg," he said.
Greg nodded solemnly, watching Russ fill the bowl and apply the match.
Except for the small crew, they were alone in the Invincible. John Moore Mallory and the others were on their own worlds, forming their own governments, carrying out the dictates of the people, men who would go down in solar history.
The Invincible hung just off Callisto. Russ looked out at the mighty moon, saw the lonely stretches of its ice-bound surface, saw the silvery spot that was the dome of Ranthoor.
"All done," said Greg, "except for one thing."
"Go out and get Chambers and the others," said Russ, puffing at the pipe.
Greg nodded. "We may as well get started."
Russ rose slowly, went to the wall cabinet and lifted out a box, the mechanical shadow with its tiny space field surrounding the fleck of steel that would lead them to the Interplanetarian. Carefully he lifted the machine from its resting place and set it on the desk. Bending over it, he watched the dials.
Suddenly he whistled. "Greg, they've moved! They aren't where we left them!"
Greg sprang to his side and stared at the readings. "They're moving farther away from us... out into space. Where can they be going?"
Russ straightened, scowling, pulling at the pipe. "They probably found another G-type star, and are heading for that. They must think it is old Sol."
"That sounds like it," said Greg. "We spun all over the map to throw Craven off and looped several times so he'd lose all sense of direction. Naturally he would be lost."
"But he's evidently got something," Russ pointed out. "We left him marooned... dead center, out where he didn't have too much radiation and couldn't get leverage on any single body. Yet he's moving--and getting farther away all the time."
"He solved our gravitation concentration screen," said Greg. "He tricked us into giving him power to build it."
The two men looked at one another for a long minute.
"Well," said Russ, "that's that. Craven and Chambers and Stutsman. The three villains. All lost in space. Heading for the wrong star. Hopelessly lost. Maybe they'll never find their way back."
He stopped and relit his pipe. An aching silence fell in the room.
"Poetic justice," said Russ. "Hail and farewell."
Greg rubbed his fist indecisively along the desk. "I can't do it, Russ. We took them out there. We marooned them. We have to get them back or I couldn't sleep nights."
Russ laughed quietly, watching the bleak face that stared at him. "I knew that's what you'd say."
He knocked out the pipe, crushed a fleck of burning tobacco with his boot. Pocketing the pipe, he walked to the control panel, sat down and reached for the lever. The engines hummed louder and louder. The Invincible darted spaceward.
IT"S too late now," said Chambers. "By the time we reach that planetary system and charge our accumulators, Manning and Page will have everything under control back in the Solar System. Even if we could locate the star that was our Sun, we wouldn't have a chance to get there in time."
"Too bad," Craven said, and wagged his head, looking like a solemn owl. "Too bad. Dictator Stutsman won't have a chance to strut his stuff."
Stutsman started to say something and thought better of it. He leaned back in his chair. From his belt hung a heat pistol.
Chambers eyed the pistol with ill-concealed disgust. "There's no point in playing soldier. We aren't going to try to upset your mutiny. So far your taking over the ship hasn't made any difference to us... so why should we fight you?"
"It isn't going to make any difference either," said Craven. "Because there are just two things that will happen to us. We're either lost forever, will never find our way back, will spend the rest of our days wandering from star to star, or Manning will come out and take us by the ear and lead us home again." Chambers started, leaned forward and fastened his steely eyes on Craven. "Do you really think he could find us?"
"I have no doubt of it," Craven replied. "I don't know how he does it, but I'm
convinced he can. Probably, however, he'll find that we are lost and get rid of us that way."
"No," said Chambers, "you're wrong there. Manning wouldn't do that. He'll come to get us."
"I don't know why he should," snapped Craven.
"Because he's that sort of man," declared Chambers.
"What you going to do when he does get out here?" demanded Stutsman. "Fall on his neck and kiss him?"
Chambers smiled, stroked his mustache. "Why, no," he said. "I imagine we'll fight. We'll give him everything we've got and he'll do the same. It wouldn't seem natural if we didn't."
"You're damned right we will," growled Stutsman. "Because I'm running this show. You seem to keep forgetting that. We have power enough, when we get those accumulators filled, to wipe him out. And that is exactly what I'm going to do."
"Fine," said Craven, mockingly, "just fine. There's just one thing you forget. Manning is the only man who can lead us back to the Solar System."
"Hell," stormed Stutsman, "that doesn't make any difference. I'll find my way back there some way."
"You're afraid of Manning," Chambers challenged.
Stutsman's hand went down to the heat pistol's grip. His eyes glazed and his face twisted itself into utter hatred. "I don't know why I keep on letting you live. Craven is valuable to me. I can't kill him. But you aren't. You aren't worth a damn to anyone."
* * *
Chambers matched his stare. Stutsman's hand dropped from the pistol and he slouched to his feet, walked from the room.
Afraid of Manning! He laughed, a hollow, gurgling laugh. Afraid of Manning!
But he was.
Within his brain hammered a single sentence. Words he had heard Manning speak as he watched over the television set at Manning's mocking invitation. Words that beat into his brain and seared his reason and made his soul shrivel and grow small.
Manning talking to Scorio. Talking to him matter-of-factly, but grimly: "I promise you that well take care of Stutsman!"
Manning had taken Scorio and his gangsters one by one and sent them to far corners of the Solar System. One out to the dreaded Vulcan fleet, one to the Outpost, one to the Titan prison, and one to the hell-hole on Vesta, while Scorio had gone to a little mountain set in a Venus swamp. They hadn't a chance. They had been locked within a force shell and shunted through millions of miles of space. No trial, no hearing... nothing. Just terrible, unrelenting judgment.